EMP TV
26.04.–05.05.2024 / Tartu
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Wed, May 1
19:00
defunensemble (Finland)

Estonian National Museum
Venue info + map

Tickets: 21/15 €

Hanna Kinnunen – flute
Mikko Raasakka – clarinet
Emil Holmström, piano
Markus Hohti – cello
Timo Kurkikangas – electronics
Anders Pohjola – electronics
Sami Klemola – artistic director


			

Lauri SupponenContinuo (2021)

Ülo KrigulCitychords I (2024, premiere)

Matti HeininenDance of the Obscura (2024)

Andrius ŠiurysMiscommunications (2015) for piano and tape

Antti Auvinen Warp my Simone (2019)

Annotations

Lauri Supponen: Continuo (2021) is a literal re-composition of Girolamo Frescobaldi’s Recercar con obligo movement from the Fiori Musicali (1635) collection. In it, a trio of musicians feed a keyboard player with live-recorded samples of their playing. Fragments of the obbligato are given to the toy piano.

Ülo Krigul: Citychords I “The camera was the initial inspiration when creating this piece. The composition is rooted in a non-musical framework, depicting a panoramic view of Manhattan from New Jersey. This setting served as the foundation for both its form and temporal structure. New York has held significance for me for quite some time. Recently, while exploring the area once more, the essence of this composition unfolded along the New Jersey coastline. The narrative begins at the southern border of Central Park and extends to the tip of the peninsula where ferries depart for Staten Island. The primary source material was a captured panorama, which I meticulously translated onto graph paper, assigning 88 keys to the musical scale, with each millimeter representing a second.”

Matti Heininen: My composition Hämärän tanssi (Dance of the Obscure, 2024) has been influenced by the atmosphere of early techno music: “Techno is everything you haven’t imagined yet.” The piece includes some direct references to the origins of techno music, Detroit Techno, where one of the aims was to find a kind of hope through imagination amidst urban darkness and poverty – “salvation in a dystopian world”. Similarly, in my own work, I have sought a kind of liberation through imagination.

True to its name, the piece contains some dance-like elements, but mainly with materials that are ill-suited for this purpose. The expressive field of the piece is formed, as it were, from this friction between expression and material. The use of live electronics supports this idea. The title of the piece also refers to a kind of awakening of the underlying, lifeless material. This is achieved by emphasising non-traditional methods of sound production, as well as a certain role for the performers, where musicians act more as controllers of sounds rather than active sound producers. The aim is to “make the obscure dance”. I have explored similar expressive fields in several of my recent works, such as the orchestral piece towards the extraordinary adventures of Baron Munchausen (2019).

The piece is dedicated to Sami Klemola and the Defunensemble. In the electronics section, I have been assisted by my longtime collaborator Erkka Lempiäinen, as well as Timo Kurkikangas of the Defunensemble. The piece premiered in April 2024 at the Tampere Biennale.

Miscommunications (2015), Andrius Šiurys: Again, most of the time, relative ‘understanding’ is an illusion. You imagine that some kindred spirit has appeared who understands what you want to say. Even though she doesn’t really understand a damn thing, but maybe she senses, maybe she smells, maybe something has vibrated a little bit and she’s picked up on it, caught a whiff of something… It’s like in communication: when two people are talking, there is very little actual communication in the text.

Warp my Simone (2019), Antti Auvinen: My main source for musical inspiration was sampled from Mozambican
singer Afric Simone’s album from the mid-70s. I loved that album when I was still a child.
I use two main sources for the text: Philosopher Simone Weil’s writings. Boeing company’s new launch (Jumbo Jet) commercials from the 1970’s.

defunensemble concert shows versatile voices in the colourful genre of Baltic electro acoustic music. History and modernity are present in these works, where diverse musical materials merge to form a kaleidoscopic concert programme.

Live-broadcast by Klassikaraadio. The event is sponsored by TelepART Mobility Support and Finnish Institute.

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